In one of those UK “trading updates” that doesn’t disclose actual data, Pearson tells investors the company is “trading ahead of expectations” so far this fiscal year and raised its earnings guidance a few pence, to “at or above 60 pence a share” for the full year. Primarily, the pound has stayed weak enough against the dollar and the company has “outperformed the US schools market.” At Penguin, currency neutral sales are down 4 percent, but with the weak pound actual sales are up 12 percent “as the expected tough retail market conditions were largely offset by a good publishing […]
International News
People and More
At Penguin Canada, editor Nicole Winstanley will take over as publisher as president David Davidar takes on additional responsibilities as ceo of Penguin International. The unit will also launch an Allen Lane Canada imprint in 2010, with Diane Turbide running the new nonfiction program as publishing director. Managing director Andrea Magyar will give up most of her editorial responsibilities to become vp of business development. Focusing on custom publishing opportunities, she’ll report directly to Davidar. Speaking of imprints, at last week’s Bouchercon Little, Brown publisher Michael Pietsch mentioned briefly that the house is working on a new crime fiction imprint. […]
Book Sales Fall 4 Percent at WH Smith
Reporting preliminary annual results for the fiscal year ending August 31, the UK’s WH Smith said sales fell 5 percent at their High Street stores, at 892 million pounds. Same-store sales on books declined 4 percent, but their gross margin increased, with high street operating profit of 49 million pounds, up 4 percent. The company credited itself with “further progress implementing our strategy to build on our authority as a popular book specialist. We saw good market share performance versus the general retail market with strong market shares in kids books and celebrity autobiographies.”Smith statement Bloomsbury offered a brief “interim […]
Random House Settles Billionaire's Vinegar Lawsuit and Apologizes, Though Author Does Not
Random House has settled a lawsuit brought by UK wine expert Michael Broadbent over the book BILLIONAIRE’S VINEGAR by Benjamin Wallace. The publisher apologized for allegations in the book that, as Broadbent’s attorneys put it, he “had behaved in an unprofessional manner in the way in which he had auctioned some bottles [said to have been owned by Thomas Jefferson] and that his relationship and dealings with Hardy Rodenstock, who discovered the original collection, was suspected of being improper.” The NYT says Random “issued a statement in court accepting that they were not true. Random House also paid an undisclosed […]
Everyone's Got a Frankfurt Press Release
One of the more interesting comes from LibreDigital, which assembled “aggregate statistics on how books are being browsed across retail and social networking sites.” They found that women browse more–comprising 54 percent of viewers, but spending “nearly 70 percent more time browsing books online than men do.” That makes it no surprise that the most popular genre browsed is romance novels. They were followed by books for tweens/teens and business books. On average, browsers looked at 46 pages of each book viewed. CEO Russell Reader says “We know that allowing readers to preview book chapters before buying has a positive […]
Fewer English-Speakers, But the World Still Gathers In Frankfurt
At the official opening press conference for the Frankfurt Book Fair today, show director Juergen Boos noted that “the economic crisis has also left its mark on the Book Fair: particularly our colleagues from the English- speaking world have reduced exhibition space due to economic developments. Eastern European exhibitors are also not present in the same numbers as last year.” But overall exhibition space is down just 2 percent this year, and Boos told the Fair’s own Publishing Perspectives more bluntly, “If you’re talking about an economic crisis, then you have to talk about an economic crisis hitting American and […]